Phasing of HMRC Penalties

Some good news for employers with up to 49 employees. Having listened to customer feedback HMRC is staggering the start of the new automatic in-year late payment and filing penalties. This will give HMRC and employers more time to adapt to reporting in real time. Small employers will not be charged late filing penalties under PAYE Real Time Information (RTI) reporting until 5 March 2015. This change follows a recent relaxation for micro employers (1 to 9 employees) which delays penalties for them until 5 April 2016.

For large employers (50 or more employees) the new RTI late filing penalty system will apply from 6 October 2014.

Tax Late Payment & Interest Charges

New automated in-year late payment penalties will start from April 2015. But in the meantime HMRC will continue to charge late payment penalties – on a risk-assessed basis – on payments due from employers for the tax year 2014-15 onwards. HMRC charge daily interest on all unpaid amounts of PAYE/NIC from the due and payable date to the date of payment, so to avoid interest charges full payment of any amounts payable should be made by the due date. The charge will be raised when payment in full has been received & HMRC will impose the charge after the end of the tax year once all the end-of-year returns have been received.

As had been expected, the 2018 Spring Statement update did not include any major tax policy announcements; rather it provided a number of consultations that suggest potential legislative changes in the future. Read more about the areas set for exploration here.